Affordable Housing Designed to Blend in With Union Park Area

After years of planning and construction, the Marshall Avenue Flats have opened and are welcoming residents to the development’s 98 units of affordable housing.

Dean Cummings, a Union Park District Council (UPDC) board member, said he and fellow members were intrigued by a development that is entirely affordable housing going up in “probably one of the most unaffordable places to live in the city.”

The new building is “bringing some balance to the neighborhood,” Cummings said.

Developers Rich Pakonen, of PAK Properties, and Clinton Blaiser, of the Halverson and Blaiser Group, impressed the UPDC by asking members in early 2020 what they would like to see developed. Three years of planning followed before construction began.

The developers designed the six-story building to reflect the architecture of the adjacent 1911 Richards Gordon School, which “Peanuts” creator Charles Schulz attended. Cream utility brick and charcoal metal panels took their cues from the former school turned office building. The developers created a new wall in the front of the building similar to a 1936 WPA wall near the former school. They also had the original limestone wall rebuilt in places.

Resident Enoch Griffin, who moved in at the beginning of June shortly after the building opened, appreciates using the gym following his liver transplant at Mayo Clinic due to a rare disease called amebiasis. He grew up in Highland Park and wanted to live in a building nearby to be close to family members.

Three months after opening, the building is 82% occupied, with the developers expecting full occupancy within a month or two.

“That just speaks to the demand for affordable housing in this neighborhood,” Pakonen said.

Saint Paul Mayor Melvin Carter said, “The Marshall Avenue Flats exemplify the bold, community-rooted investments we must make in every corner of our city – so every family has the opportunity to grow, prosper, and thrive.”

This project utilized LIHTC (low-income housing tax credits) to ensure 100% of the units are affordable. The tax credit investor was Cinnaire’s joint venture with the Greater Minnesota Housing Fund and our Minnesota Equity Fund was the syndicator.

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Photo credit: Brandon Stengel